Chapter 44

Zale watched the news from the safety of Shai's estate. It wasn't just local news. He was following global news from his laptop. The planet across was in an uproar. To date, only twelve tier 10 dungeons had ever been officially recorded, though highly contested historical speculation existed.

Those that had appeared were either in remote areas that posed no threat or were taken care of by large countries, with the exception of one in the southern United States and one in rural China on the border of Russia. Both of these were deemed dormant after initial activity, which led the countries to take no risk.

Now, however, five new tier 10 gates had appeared. One in Egypt, France, the USA, China, and India. The news was swarming with the buzz of what it meant, what the countries would do, and how many more dungeons might appear. Already, interviews were flying left and right with country officials and, more importantly, the CEOs of the most powerful hunter associations in the world, those that commanded the strength of the tier 10 hunters.

Zale watched Shai's press conference, which was held shortly after his meeting with Obelisk. He hadn't known that Obelisk, with the combined strength of most of the Middle East, was ranked as the fifth strongest in the world. "And Shai is trying to fight against a monster like that? It's insane," he muttered in disbelief.

"He is the Pharaoh, king of Egypt, after all. It is not only his duty by birth but his deep desire to lead his people to prosperity. You happen to be in a very peculiar position to help him while seeing him as an equal," Mert reminded him.

Several hours passed since the news spread, and night slunk across the carpet of his room. He drew closed the curtains and turned the lights on, rubbing the stress from his eyes. "Have you heard anything about the project...or not. You'd have told me otherwise," Zale addressed Mert, who had been quietly reading in his room since they'd arrived back.

"Nothing, sir," she confirmed.

Zale hung his head with an exaggerated sigh. "Of course. I guess he's going to be too busy with things for a while. I'll have to step up."

He looked around the room in search of inspiration for his next course of action. Having gotten used to the luxury, he realized how barren the room was in its lack of personality. "I suppose I need to know everything there is to know," he concluded.

He dismissed Mert for the night and began reading. From then, he spent every waking moment he could with his face buried in the tablet. Zale spent his time eating, sleeping, and reading at the palace estate, usually in his room or in the garden.

Despite his incredible reading speed, he only managed to complete one to three books a day, depending on the difficulty of their contents. He started with the material on the forge and its operation. Once he finished with those documents, he moved on to the books in the collection from the Coma Library, which Shai's ancestors have borrowed, copied, and returned.

He started with one on forging items, then one on monsters. There was another about the gates that opened, one briefly touching on monsters and other races, and three on different forms of magic and spells. Zale made a mental note of all three of their contents and also bookmarked them for later. Between these heavy slogs, he read the historical data on ancient Egypt. Anything related to magic, blessings, and the gates. He did confirm the existence of at least two unofficial tier 10 gates in the past five millennia.

On the eighth day, while sipping tea in the garden behind the estate, Zale started into the most promising book on crystals and cores. Immediately he began making connections that lead back to 'Mana.'